I Kings 2:1-12; Mark 9:2-9

Let us Pray - O Lord, in the light of your presence we turn our attention to your teaching, seeking what you want to say to us. May the light of your gospel so illuminate us that we may receive a double portion of your Spirit and the assurance that we are indeed your beloved servants. For Christ's sake we ask it. Amen.

I was at a meeting the other day when the treasurer handed the secretary an envelop. A bit later in the meeting the chairperson asked the secretary for some information - but the secretary replied that she didn't have that information. At the point the treasurer rose and said "yes - you do - it is was on the envelop I gave you."

The secretary replied, "Oh, I didn't know what that was - so I threw it away "

Everyone laughed - including me - but I was struck at the time by just how normal the secretary's actions had been.

Often when we encounter something which we do not know or understand we throw it away; or at the very least - we ignore it - we put it on hold - we neglect it.

So it is with stories like those we heard today from the scriptures. Many of us hear about visions of chariots of fire, of water being parted to reveal a path across a river, and of a man being taken up into heaven - and mentally shrug our shoulders and dismiss the matter as an idle tale.

Others hear about how Jesus was transformed upon a mountaintop, so that he shone as bright as the sun, and about how he is visited by two men - long dead, and say to themselves - that's all very nice, but what does it have to do with me - and then they go on about their lives as if these things had never happened,as if they never can or will happen.

Most sermons I have had heard on today's gospel reading ignore the experience that the disciples witnessed Jesus undergo.

Very little is said in them about the overwhelming brightness of Jesus' appearance, very little is made of the fact that Peter, James, and John saw Moses and Elijah talking with Christ and heard a voice from heaven.

Most of these sermons have in fact quickly passed over the wonder of the experience and go on to stress how Christians are called to come down off the mountain and serve in the valley below.

I find that to be a great shame.

I find it to be a great shame as well how so many of us ignore, neglect, devalue, or scorn the prophet's ecstasy, the dreamer's vision, and the worshipper's conviction that he or she has heard God speak.

Most of us are convinced that our faith is about doing good things, about showing love and care for one another, and it is so - this is what our faith is about.

But our faith is also about the yearning to see God and experience his power, it is about being touched by the Spirit and being moved by the voice of the Lord whispering in our ears.

Our faith is so rich - our God so good - that it makes no sense at all to limit what is possible for us to the dry bones of what we should or should not do each day.

Our faith is about entertaining angels, every bit as much as it is about seeking to comfort the afflicted and to heal the sick. It is about seeing visions of a new heaven and a new earth, every bit as much as it is about seeking justice and resisting evil.

It is about being refreshed by God, as much as it is about refreshing others in God's name.

A little boy, around the turn of the century, lived far back in the New Territories. He had reached the age of 12 and had never, in all his life, seen a circus.

You can imagine his excitement when a poster went up at school that on the next Saturday a travelling circus was coming to Hong Kong. He ran home with the glad news, and then came the question - "Dad, Mom, can I go?"

The family was poor, but the father sensed how important this was to the boy, so he said, "If you do your chores ahead of time, I'll see to it that you have the money to go."

Come Saturday morning the chores were done and the boy stood ready in best clothes by the breakfast table. His father reached down into his overalls and pulled out some money - the most money the boy had ever had at one time - and gave it to him. After the usual cautions about being careful the boy was sent on his way.

The boys was so excited that his feet barely touched the ground all the way to the town. When he got there, he noticed people were lining the streets and he worked his way through the crowd until he could see what was going on. There in the distance approached the spectacle of a circus parade. It was the grandest thing that the boy had ever seen. There were exotic animals in cages and bands and midgets, acrobats, and all that goes to make up a great circus.

After everything had passed by where he was standing, a circus clown, with floppy shoes and baggy paints and brightly painted face, came by bringing up the rear. As the clown passed by where he was standing, the boy reached into his pocket and got out the precious he was given that morning. Handing the money to the clown, the boy then turned around and went home.

The mistake that the boy made - is the same mistake we can make in our spiritual lives - we can end up settling for less than the real thing, for a portion - instead of for the whole, and all because we either do not believe in what God can do, or because we do not look at or understand what we have been given.

I did not know what it was, so I threw it away.

I believe the most common problem faced by members of most churches is not the fact that they spend too much time seeking spiritual visions and revelations - thereby neglecting the important truths and duties of everyday life in Christ, rather it is the fact that they do not believe in and thus are not open to the special moments, the special touches, that only God can give.

Some of the faithful say that people have no energy for living the Christian life because they do not get fed by the church - I say - some people are out of energy because they fail to recognize the food that is before them - because they fail to take and eat what God seeks to give them.

When I lived in England there was a weekly prayer meeting held at our church. Of the hundred or so adults that attended church every week, only about 15 or so attended this meeting.

There they sought spiritual food for their daily journey in the Lord. There they found it.

I remember one time when a guest preacher was present at the meeting.

We prayed for one another with the laying on of hands, we prayed for healings - for people to have the power to overcome some grief or suffering in their lives - for others to discover what God wanted them to do about a particular situation.

Finally my turn came to be prayed for - and I asked that all might pray that God would fill me with his Spirit - that he might make my faith come even more alive.

When the hands came down on my head and shoulders and the people gathered around me began to pray - I felt a energy go through my body like electricity, and I shook in my chair as the words of prayer washed over me, and then, in a moment of sudden silence, one word came strongly from the guest - a word came strongly from God - "You shall be used to do great things in my service."

To this day those words have stayed with me and shaped my thoughts - making me wonder what the greatness is - making me wonder - is it the power and glory like that of great evangelist or theologian, - or is it the greatness that was revealed by Christ as he went about as the servant of all, stooping down even to wash his own disciple's feet?

It was a moment that fed me and still feeds me - a profoundly spiritual moment.

My friends - I can't explain out to you what a holy moment is; nor can I tell you just how special and sacred events come to pass, nor can I even promise you that you will have such a moment if you only do this or that, but I can tell, and I do now tell you, that these moments are real, and that they come to us most often when we put ourselves in the way of them.

As another preacher put it one time You can't have a mountain top experience if you don't climb the mountain.

Elisha followed his teacher Elijah around the country despite Elijah telling him not to when he had his experience; he actively sought a double portion of the spirit that filled Elijah and was patient to receive it.

Peter, James, and John were obeying Jesus when they witnessed his transfiguration, they had climbed the mountain with him as he went to pray.

The sacred experiences that are recounted in the bible, the experiences of the divine that are recorded there, are still needed today - and they still occur today.

Some catch sight of God in the beauty around them, some glimpse him during a close encounter with death, some meet him in a special way during a period of suffering, others while they are praying at special gatherings or at worship.

Don't throw away those strange and mysterious experiences that have happened in your lives. Don't let go of those things that you do not understand or cannot explain. Rather meditate on them, delight in them, and use them as a source of strength for your time of service in the valleys below.

Oh how lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of Hosts! My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the Living God. Amen